Prophetic Meaning of the Yom Kippur Scapegoat

Scapegoat
What was God saying prophetically
to Israel?

Yom Kippur begins at sundown on 1-Oct-2025 & ends at nightfall on 2-Oct-2025.

The key biblical verses of Yom Kippur are Leviticus 16 and Leviticus 23–32, which detail the rituals performed by the high priest, including the use of a bull, a ram, and two goats—one sacrificed and the other sent into the wilderness as a scapegoat.

BECAUSE the Fall Feasts of the LORD are directly related to how God is going to SPIRITUALLY RESTORE Israel, the scapegoat sent into the wilderness of Sin (Zin means sin) must be understood as speaking prophetically.

The Yom Kippur blood sacrifice of a bull, a ram, and one of two goats is the prophetic picture of the sacrifice of Yeshua/Jesus own life that is also portrayed in the Passover in the Spring biblical Feasts of the Lord.

Why do we see two of the Feasts of the LORD that prophetically pictures of the blood sacrifice of Yeshua? Because God is speaking specifically to Israel in these feasts.

In the Passover Feast the prophetic picture was of the first harvest of Israeli Jews that we are given account of in the gospels, the book of Acts and the letters that follow. Then because God has promised He would return to Israel in the fullness of time to restore them spiritually by faith in their Messiah Yeshua, this is what is picture prophetically in Yom Kippur.

In Yom Kippur there are two goats – one representing the “once for all” sacrifice of Yeshua, and the other, called the scapegoat. Israel is that scapegoat. This should not seem strange to any Christian who understands that in coming to faith we have been told that to be found “in Him” we will partake in the “fellowship of His suffering.” (Philippians 3:10) The same applied to Israel who in order to be found in Him have surely tasted the fellowship of His sufferings in this 2,000 year exile. As God continues to remove the veil from Jewish eyes, they will also recognize themselves as the Yom Kippur scapegoat.

Israel was sent out into the wilderness of sin truly made a scapegoat as God set Israel aside for a season in order to bring the nations into salvation by faith. How can this be seen as anything else but becoming a scapegoat in order to share the fellowship of their Messiah’s sufferings?

In Zechariah 1:14-16, isn’t this making the Jews the scapegoat of the world exactly what God is referring to?

“Then the angel who was speaking with me said, “Proclaim this word: This is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘I am very jealous for Jerusalem and Zion, ***but I am fiercely angry with the nations that are at ease. For I was a little angry, but they have added to the calamity.’ *** Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘I will return to Jerusalem with mercy, and there My house will be rebuilt, declares the LORD of Hosts.

I  can understand collective Jewish reluctance to identify with the scapegoat of Yom Kippur. But seeing the Day of Atonement as a prophetic picture from God to Israel as all the biblical Feasts of the Lord, what else could God be telling Israel to recognize themselves in His mysterious, grand plan to be? I believe that was what the Apostle Paul was thinking in one of the last things he said in Romans 11 before breaking out in his great hymn of praise from Isaiah 40:-9-31.

Romans 11:28-32 Paul explains why in exile the Jewish people became the scapegoat sent into the wilderness of sin – exiled to all nations by God for the sake of the gospel to all nations. Paul ends his three chapters of addressing Christians on their true relationship to the Jewish people, the people Israel from God’s own perspective. Then the apostle ends his explanation of this mystery by quote Isaiah’s doxology!

Romans 11:28 Regarding the gospel, they are enemies on your account; but regarding election, they are loved on account of the patriarchs. 29 For God’s gifts and His call are irrevocable.

30 Just as you who formerly disobeyed God have now received mercy through their disobedience, 31 so they too have now disobeyed, in order that they too may now receive mercy through the mercy shown to you. 32 For God has consigned everyone to disobedience so that He may have mercy on everyone.

Romans 11:33-36 |A Hymn of Praise quoting Isaiah 40:9–31
O, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable are His judgments, and untraceable His ways!
“Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been His counselor?”
“Who has first given to God, that God should repay him?”
For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things.
To Him be the glory forever! Amen.